Murray pinching herself after world championship gold

Britain’s Samantha Murray is the new modern pentathlon world champion after clinching gold in Warsaw.

Murray, who won silver at the London 2012 Olympics, also clocked a new pentathlon world record as she won the 200m freestyle swim in a time of 2:03.84.

The 24-year-old looked relaxed as she climbed from third to first in the run/shoot to secure gold and the Clitheroe pentathlete could scarcely believe what she had achieved.

“It doesn’t feel real,” she said. “I’ve worked so hard for this and I’ve been aiming for this competition for a while.

“To be able to say I’m world champion is absolutely fantastic. I dreamed of this so often and now my dream has come true.

“When I started to relax and smile today all the work I have put in came through. I couldn't believe how easy the combined event felt. I was really on top of it today.

“My coaches Istvan (Nemeth), Frici (Foldes) and Jan (Bartu) have had so much faith in me. They've given me so much support and pushed me when I needed it and my training partners have been great. I owe a massive thank you to so many people."

Murray is Britain’s fourth individual woman modern pentathlon world champion and follows in the footsteps of Wendy Norman (1982), Steph Cook (2001) and Mhairi Spence (2012).

Jan Bartu, Pentathlon GB Performance Director, said: “It was a world class performance. It’s fantastic to see her back because it hasn’t been easy for her over the last year.

“She decided to go for it and this is the reward for the hard work. She showed maximum composure in the combined event today.

“It was an amazing improvement on how she was shooting last year and it's a credit to Istvan Nemeth and the coaching team, and to the English Institute of Sport team who have all contributed to this success.”

And there was a double celebration as Murray joined up with Kate French and Freyja Prentice to secure the silver medal for Great Britain in the team competition.

The trio were beaten by China and Bartu conceded Britain lost out to a high-class team.

“It was a well-deserved silver medal for the team today,” he added. “They were beaten by a better team – the Chinese were almost perfect.”